Donald Trump was jeered by social media users for his "word salad" comments about cryptocurrency during an interview with Fox Business Network.
The Republican presidential nominee touched on proposals, including ones by Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY) and former House speaker Paul Ryan, for the U.S. government to invest in cryptocurrency to help pay down the national debt, although Trump offered few specifics in his comments to host Maria Bartiromo.
"Crypto is a very interesting thing, very high level in certain ways, intellectually very high level," Trump said. "If we don't do it, China's going to do it. China's already doing it, and if we don't do it, other countries are going to do it, so we might as well be at the forefront. There are people in crypto that are very, very smart people who do love our country and they think it's good. Who knows, maybe we'll pay off our $35 trillion [national debt], hand them a crypto check, hand over a little Bitcoin, and wipe out our $35 trillion."
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"It's already prominent, it's moving along," Trump added. "It's loosely regulated, that's one of the reasons it's moving along. It is a different form of a currency, it's going to end up benefiting the country, but if we shut it down like [president Joe] Biden's trying to shut it down – Biden doesn't have the intellect to shut it down. Can you image imagine this guy is telling you to shut something down like that? He has no idea what the hell it is."
The president issued an executive order in March 2022 calling for improved consumer and investors protection and other regulations on crypto markets, which Trump has called a "war on crypto," but his comments to Bartiromo prompted some head scratching.
"'Hand them a little crypto check' – the boomerest Boomer ever to boom," said Brooke Harrington, a sociology professor at Dartmouth College.
"Trump with a word salad about crypto," said journalist Aaron Rupar. "To any of my followers who are not savvy about crypto, let me inform you that a 'little crypto check' is not a thing."
"Donald Trump has no idea what bitcoin even is," said X user Denison Barb. "This is why his speech at the bitcoin convention was a disaster.
"What a F moron," said the account Republicans Against Trump.
"We'll pay off a debt in dollars not by *simply making more dollars,* but by making more dollars to buy crypto from sinister billionaire Trump supporters like Peter Thiel -- which we will then use to buy dollars, because nobody accepts crypto as payment for anything," said X user Gavin M Friday.
"Now Trump is trying to get his Bitcoin buddies to join him and grift even more from them," said X user Matt Bartruff. "I got to hand it to him. No one is better at parting suckers from their funds."
"Did your grandmother have a magical purse like this, always full of hard candies and Andes chocolate mints ready to hand out whenever you were a good boy, and where she kept all her crypto checks to pay off debt to foreign countries?" said pediatric hospitalist Clay Jones.
